PizzaUp and "original" cereals

Piero Gabrieli explains the topic of the new edition of the technical meeting organised at Università della Pizza

15-10-2017 | 18:00

After the extraordinary edition in March dedicated to frying techniques for pizza, the awaited annual PizzaUp event, the technical gathering on Italian pizza organised by Università della Pizza returns. This year there’s a U turn on the theme of dough, so as to open a new debate on its recent evolution.

Kneading techniques are crucial tools for a pizzaiolo’s profession. Dough, more than seasonings, interprets pizza following the cultural rules typical of a territory.

A deeper knowledge of cereals, which are the main component of dough, is very useful in order to organise a complete palette of colours, flavours and aromas, and be aware of how important the rediscovery of forgotten Italian origins is for our environment and economy.

But why original cereals? We often speak of "ancient wheat varieties". Unfortunately with a confusion amplified by the speedy and uncontrollable news circulating online. Calling ancient species and varieties that were born only one hundred years ago is a mistake. Monococco spelt is, for instance, a truly ancient wheat variety, because its origin dates back to the beginning of human civilization and its bread-making characteristics and nutritional features are truly different compared to modern tender wheat.

So it’s best to speak of "ORIGINAL CEREALS" to stress the origin and provenance of the ingredient, that is to say the elements that are really useful to define its sensorial and nutritional characteristics, as well as following its journey to consumption. We will do so at PizzaUp with representatives of academic research and the Italian agricultural world that looks at the future of our diet.